4,500 more midwives needed

20th January 2011

NHS chief executive David Nicholson has admitted that the country is still short of 4,500 midwives.

And while he insisted that the government was working through plans to increase numbers he acknowledged that its planning of midwifery services could have been better. Speaking to the Commons public accounts committee: “Over the last three or four years it has become clear as we have revised figures on the birth rate that our planning for midwifery services has not been as it should have been.”